Bøger udgivet af National Academies Press

The report examines the Environmental Protection Agency's three-year plan for a comprehensive response to a chemical or biological attack on a civilian or public sector facility. The report states that EPA has correctly identified the essential major research areas (detection, containment, decontamination, and disposal) but calls for an initial focus on decontamination and disposal efforts and a longer term research program.

The report examines a draft plan, prepared by the Environmental Protection Agency, that identifies critical security issues for drinking water and wastewater and outlines related research and technical support needs. This report recommends increased attention to interagency coordination and encourages additional consideration of current restrictions on secure information dissemination. It further suggests that EPA incorporate the results of their research activities into an integrated water security guidance document to improve support for water and wastewater utilities.

Boston's Central Artery/Tunnel Project, a 7.8 mile system of bridges and underground highways and ramps, is the most expensive public works project ever undertaken in the United States. The original cost estimate of $2.6 billion has already been exceeded by $12 billion, and the project will not be completed until 2005, seven years late. The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority (MTA), the public steward of the project, requested that the National Research Council carry out an independent assessment of the project's management and contract administration practices, with a focus on the present situation and measures that should be taken to bring the project to a successful conclusion. This report presents the committee's findings and recommendations pertaining to cost, scheduling, and transitioning from the current organization dominated by consultants to an operations organization composed largely of full-time MTA staff. The report recommends that MTA establish an external, independent, peer-review program to address technical and management issues until the transition to operations and maintenance is complete; begin a media campaign now to teach drivers how to use the new system safely; and develop, immediately implement, and maintain a comprehensive security program.

This report reviews documents on acute exposure guideline levels (AEGLs) for nerve agents GA (tabun), GB (sarin), GD (soman), GD, and VX, sulfur mustard, diborane, and methyl isocyanate. The documents were developed by the National Advisory Committee on Acute Exposure Guideline Levels for Hazardous Chemicals (NAC). The subcommittee concludes that the AEGLs developed in those documents are scientifically valid conclusions based on data reviewed by NAC and are consistent with the NRC reports on developing acute exposure guideline levels.

Over the past half century, the international flow of goods, services, and capital has grown rapidly. Globalization creates new economic, cultural, and social opportunities, but also poses the challenge of ensuring that workers throughout the world share in these opportunities. Responding to this challenge, the U.S. government carries out a variety of policies and programs aimed at encouraging greater recognition of worker rights around the globe. The U.S. Department of State monitors worker rights abroad and reports on the status of those rights as part of its annual report to Congress in the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. Building on this history of monitoring and encouraging worker rights around the world, the Trade Act of 2002 includes on the list of overall trade negotiating objectives of the United States, promote respect for worker rights. Monitoring International Labor Standards provides expert, science-based advice on monitoring compliance with international labor standards. This report identifies relevant, valid, reliable, and useful sources of country-level data on labor standards; assesses the quality of existing and potential data and indicators that can be used to systematically monitor labor practices and the effectiveness of enforcement in order to determine compliance with national labor legislation and international standards; identifies innovative measures to determine compliance with international labor standards on a country-by-country basis and to measure progress on improved labor legislation and enforcement; explores the relationship between labor standards compliance and national policies relating to human capital issues; and recommends sustainable reporting procedures to monitor countries' progress toward implementation of international labor standards.

All critical infrastructures are increasingly dependent on the information infrastructure for information management, communications, and control functions. Protection of the critical information infrastructure (CIIP), therefore, is of prime concern. To help with this step, the National Academy of Engineering asked the NRC to assess the various legal issues associated with CIIP. These issues include incentives and disincentives for information sharing between the public and private sectors, and the role of FOIA and antitrust laws as a barrier or facilitator to progress. The report also provides a preliminary analysis of the role of criminal law, liability law, and the establishment of best practices, in encouraging various stakeholders to secure their computer systems and networks.

Accurate and timely environmental information can provide a tactical advantage to U.S. naval forces during warfare. This report analyzes the current environmental information system used by the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps and recommends ways to address uncertainty and leverage network-centric operating principles to enhance the value of environmental information.

Noteworthy progress has been made recently toward understanding and quantifying the smoke toxicity factors involved in fire hazard assessment. Such progress has led to increased attention to the significance of fire growth parameters for toxic hazard. Methodology has been proposed to use fire test data, including information on the toxic potency of smoke in engineering calculations for the assessment of overall fire hazard. Confidence in the methodology may evolve from comparison with full-scale fire tests as well as from human fire fatality experience. This report addresses fire modeling, fire testing, smoke toxicity testing, fire hazard assessment, and fire risk assessment. In the assessment of potential toxic hazards in the event of fires in mass transit vehicles, the report concludes that selection of candidate materials should be based on analyses using both toxicological and engineering considerations.

As requested by Congress and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), this report assists federal agencies in crafting plans and reports that are responsive to the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA), OMB Guidance, and agency missions. Using a case study approach, the report identifies best practices used by individual agencies to evaluate the performance and results of their science and technology programs. The report takes into account individual agencies' missions and how science and technology programs and human resource needs are factored into agency GPRA plans. Specific applications of recommendations are included from COSEPUP's earlier report entitled Evaluating Federal Research Programs: Research and the Government Performance and Results Act.

In 1996, NATO issued guidance for the exposure of military personnel to radiation doses different from occupational dose levels, but not high enough to cause acute health effects-and in doing so set policy in a new arena. Scientific and technological developments now permit small groups or individuals to use, or threaten to use, destructive devices (nuclear, biological, chemical, and cyber-based weaponry, among others) targeted anywhere in the world. Political developments, such as the loss of political balance once afforded by competing superpowers, have increased the focus on regional and subregional disputes. What doctrine should guide decisionmaking regarding the potential exposure of troops to radiation in this changed theater of military operations? In 1995, the Office of the U.S. Army Surgeon General asked the Medical Follow-up Agency of the Institute of Medicine to provide advice. This report is the final product of the Committee on Battlefield Radiation Exposure Criteria convened for that purpose. In its 1997 interim report, Evaluation of Radiation Exposure Guidance for Military Operations, the committee addressed the technical aspects of the NATO directive. In this final report, the committee reiterates that discussion and places it in an ethical context.

The 1997 Conference on the World Climate Research Programme to the Third Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change concluded that the global capacity to observe the Earth's climate system is inadequate and is deteriorating worldwide. As a result, the chair of the subcommittee of the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) requested a National Research Council study to assess the current status of the climate observing capabilities of the United States. This report focuses on existing observing systems for detection and attribution of climate change, with special emphasis on those systems with long time series.

The US Environmental Protection Agency Office of Radiation and Indoor Air asked the National Research Council to evaluate whether sufficient new data exist to warrant a reassessment of health risks reported in Health Effects of Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiations (BEIR V) in 1990. To respond to this request, the National Research Council assembled the Committee on Health Risks of Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiations. The work of the committee was conducted in what was called the BEIR VII phase-1 study. To assist the committee during its deliberations, various scientists were consulted for advice, and a workshop on the impact of biology on risk assessment was held in collaboration with the Department of Energy Office of Health and Environmental Research. The intent of the workshop was to address the implications of new understanding of the biologic basis of radiation injury and carcinogenesis for risk assessment.

This book provides a brief overview of worldwide terrorist activity and reviews technologies and methods for designing blast resistant buildings. These techniques, primarily developed by the military, have applicability and relevance to the design of civilian structures. The volume recommends that a program of applied research and technology transfer be undertaken to hasten the availability and utility of these techniques to the civilian building community.

Biographic Memoirs: Volume 64 contains the biographies of deceased members of the National Academy of Sciences and bibliographies of their published works. Each biographical essay was written by a member of the Academy familiar with the professional career of the deceased. For historical and bibliographical purposes, these volumes are worth returning to time and again.

The site of a proposed repository for high-level radioactive waste from the nation's nuclear power plants is not at risk of ground water infiltration, concludes this important book. Yucca Mountain, located about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has been proposed as the site for permanent underground disposal of high-level radioactive waste from the nation's civilian nuclear power plants. To resolve concerns raised by a Department of Energy (DOE) staff scientist concerning the potential for ground water to rise 1,000 feet to the level proposed for the repository, DOE requested this study to evaluate independently the past history and future potential of large upward excursions of the ground water beneath Yucca Mountain.

The goal of this book is to determine what makes certain doctoral/postdoctoral programs in mathematical sciences successful in producing large numbers of domestic Ph.D.s, including women and underrepresented minorities with sufficient professional experience and versatility to meet the research, teaching, and industrial needs of our technology-based society. Educating Mathematical Scientists describes the characteristics of successful doctoral/postdoctoral programs, based on the diverse set of 10 universities at which site visits were made.

TRB Special Report 217: New Organizational Responses to the Changing Transit Environment assesses the effectiveness of transit organizational structures now being used and those developed in recent years, and identifies further organization changes appropriate to the new conditions and pressures transit faces.

This series of individually authored chapters examines the nature and extent of scientific advances in the nutrition sciences and describes both future opportunities in the field and barriers to progress. Despite concern about declining attention to nutrition in universities and medical schools, the authors offer a bright and challenging future in nutrition research and training that should generate enthusiasm among young researchers and teachers for this indispensable component of biology.

The most recent volume in the Drinking Water and Health series contains the results of a two-part study on the toxicity of drinking water contaminants. The first part examines current practices in risk assessment, identifies new noncancerous toxic responses to chemicals found in drinking water, and discusses the use of pharmacokinetic data to estimate the delivered dose and response. The second part of the book provides risk assessments for 14 specific compounds, 9 presented here for the first time.

Various editions of the Dictionary of Occupational Titles have served as the Employment Service's basic tool for matching workers and jobs. The Dictionary of Occupational Titles has also played an important role in establishing skill and training requirements and developing Employment Service testing batteries for specific occupations. However, the role of the Dictionary of Occupational Titles has been called into question as a result of planned changes in the operation of the Employment Service. A plan to automate the operations of Employment Service offices using a descriptive system of occupational keywords rather than occupational titles has led to a claim that a dictionary of occupational titles and the occupational research program that produces it are outmoded. Since the automated keyword system does not rely explicitly on defined occupational titles, it is claimed that the new system would reduce costs by eliminating the need for a research program to supply the occupational definitions. In light of these considerations, the present volume evaluates the future need for the Dictionary of Occupational Titles.

Late last year, the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) convened a workshop on Preparing the Engineering and Technical Workforce for Adaptability and Resilience to Change. The workshop springs from the earlier NAE report Making Value for America which described the ongoing transformation in the way in which products and services are conceived, designed, made, and distributed. The workshop focused on the challenges facing the workforce in light of these dramatic changes in the production process, especially the need to constantly renew and learn new skills. The workshop served to increase stakeholders' understanding of both the importance of workforce adaptability and the definition and characteristics of adaptability. It also provided an opportunity to share known best practices for fostering adaptability, including identification of barriers and multiple pathways for overcoming those barriers. As important, it helped to identify needs for future study and development. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussions from the workshop.

"In spring 2011 the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine produced a report outlining the next decade in planetary sciences. That report, titled Vision and Voyages for Planetary Science in the Decade 2013-2022, and popularly referred to as the "decadal survey," has provided high-level prioritization and guidance for NASA's Planetary Science Division. Other considerations, such as budget realities, congressional language in authorization and appropriations bills, administration requirements, and cross-division and cross-directorate requirements (notably in retiring risk or providing needed information for the human program) are also necessary inputs to how NASA develops its planetary science program. In 2016 NASA asked the National Academies to undertake a study assessing NASA's progress at meeting the objectives of the decadal survey. After the study was underway, Congress passed the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Transition Authorization Act of 2017 which called for NASA to engage the National Academies in a review of NASA's Mars Exploration Program. NASA and the Academies agreed to incorporate that review into the midterm study. That study has produced this report, which serves as a midterm assessment and provides guidance on achieving the goals in the remaining years covered by the decadal survey as well as preparing for the next decadal survey, currently scheduled to begin in 2020"--

"Disasters tend to cross political, jurisdictional, functional, and geographic boundaries. As a result, disasters often require responses from multiple levels of government and multiple organizations in the public and private sectors. This means that public and private organizations that normally operate independently must work together to mount an effective disaster response. To identify and understand approaches to aligning health care system incentives with the American public's need for a health care system that is prepared to manage acutely ill and injured patients during a disaster, public health emergency, or other mass casualty event, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine hosted a 2-day public workshop on March 20 and 21, 2018. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussions from the workshop"--Publisher's description.